author
Lizzie Doten
1827–1913
A 19th-century American poet and spiritualist lecturer, she became famous for poems she said were inspired by the spirits of writers such as Edgar Allan Poe. Her work sits at the unusual crossroads of literature, performance, reform, and the Spiritualist movement.
3 Audiobooks
Poems from the Inner Life
by Lizzie Doten
Poems of Progress
by Lizzie Doten
About the author
Born in Plymouth, Massachusetts, Elizabeth "Lizzie" Doten was an American poet, lecturer, and trance speaker whose career flourished in the mid- to late 1800s. She wrote poetry, fiction, and essays, and became one of the best-known women associated with American Spiritualism.
She drew wide attention for public performances in which she said spirits influenced or dictated her poems, especially the spirits of famous dead writers including Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Burns, William Shakespeare, and Felicia Hemans. That unusual claim, along with her strong stage presence, made her a notable and sometimes controversial literary figure of her time.
Doten also took part in broader reform conversations, including women's rights, and edited the spiritualist annual Lily of the Valley. Today she is remembered both for her verse and for the way her life captures a fascinating moment when poetry, religion, performance, and social change were deeply intertwined.